Consume
by Totchiya
Summary: AU-ish. A new sorceress appears, Squall dissappears, and everyone is rather confused. A bit of violence in the first couple parts, and a major character dies, sort-of.
1. Prologue

**Consume**

**notes:**This fic is not divided into chapters as such - rather it is placed in relatively short sections based on how and where I feel that they seem to end. They may get longer as I proceed, but the prologue and first few chapters are rather small. For the most part, they will not be longer than a scene or two. 

A quick note on the characters in this fanfic. I have borrowed a few characters from **Vagrant Story**, and also, this is an **AU** (Alter Universe). As they grew up in different worlds and in different ways, the characters will not be the same as they were in their original settings. Seifer and Squall are best friends in this fic, and the only things the same about Ashley and Sydney are their appearances and their names. You don't have to play Vagrant Story to read this - the characters won't match up at all, if you haven't played it, you can now read on!

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**Consume - Prologue**

The voice. It was everywhere. It filled the air. It _ was _ the air. He couldn't breath. He didn't need to. It was sound. It was taste. It was light. It was blinding.

He stood there in the fog of white light and sweet sounds and the smell and taste of heady wine. And he was taken. He wanted nothing more than to remain within this voice and its addictive promises of pleasure and victory and happiness. It was his paradise.

A blade flashed through the blinding white and he smelled blood. _His_ blood. A voice, different, muffled. Blocking his path to his Utopia.

_No!_ He would not let anyone stand in his way! The voice boiled and screamed - kill him - let no one thwart you - he hurt you - kill him.

He grasped his blade. The voice danced around him, filling his eyes with hate and his mouth with cries of death.

His sword slashed forward, again and again, towards his faceless foe. One last quick thrust and pull to the side, and his attacker was disemboweled.

The voice rejoiced at the victory and filled his head with whispered praises. The fog cleared a little, and he stared down at the bloody corpse of his best friend.


	2. Chapter One

**Consume - Chapter One**

Dead... He's dead...

No... Shut up...

He's dead, he's dead, he's dead.

Please... don't...

Dead dead dead dead dead!

No! Shutup shutup shutup!

Gods... so much blood... my fault... My fault... I... It should have been...

_And the part of Squall's mind that wasn't in complete denial howled and sobbed like his world had just ended._

_Of course, it had._

_And the voice was all that was left_


	3. Chapter Two

Whoop! I got my first review ever! Yay for **UltraBeing**! Have a cookie! A _really, really big_ cookie. And you are right, those first parts are too short, but I had to cut the emotional drivel off somewhere, or else it would have gone on for _pages_.

Well, this chapter is where it starts to get a bit longer, but it's also where a good chunk of the angst dies. Have no fear, there will be more later, but I'm a sucker for happy fics, so this is what you get.

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**Consume - Chapter Two**

At least an hour gone, maybe more. The blood was drying on the dusty, cracked earth; a splash of crimson in an ocean of brown. Squall was gone, sobbing inside his head, following a whisper that nobody else would be able to hear. And Seifer... 

The flies had already started to gather, drawn across the endless desert to this one place of red, to feed on the corpse of a once proud man.

Only, not so much a corpse.

And Seifer...

Something shifted in the air, a slight breeze and the scent of something green and living, unheard of in this dry place. The sand stirred around his body, and something happened.

And Seifer...

Seifer awoke suddenly, jolting off the hard ground, groaning and spitting up blood and vomit. The flies left him in favor of this unexpected treat. He pulled himself off of his side and onto his hands and knees and emptied his stomach for the last time, then continued to heave despite the absence of anything to expel. With a noise that could only be described as a whimper he collapsed panting on his stomach in his own blood and vomit. He pressed his face into the dry ground and inhaled deeply, trying to get the smell of his own blood out of his nose. The dust he inhaled caught him by surprise, and he spent a moment coughing and hacking to get it all out. When he was done he could no longer smell it, and if he closed his eyes he could almost ignore the fact that he had just died. He lay there for a while.

Eventually something happened. The air shifted again, and someone appeared where before there had been nothing. A shadow fell across Seifer's face, but he found himself too tired to move, or to really care. "Seifer? Are you all right?" That voice - anxious, caring, _known_. Rinoa. Seifer found the strength to pry one eye open.

"H'lo 'Noa."

"Oh thank goodness you're alive. I was on my way here when I healed you, and I wasn't sure...." She was all business and thinly veiled fear and relief and filled with things she was afraid to say as she knelt next to him and helped him onto his back to check his wounds. "You'll be fine but there's still some superficial damage here.... Let me..."

"Shit, woman, watch what you're doing! That fucking hurt!"

She grinned impishly at him, trying to cover up the horror of the situation with humor. "Somebody's not getting a present from me this year...."

He looked confused. "Present? What...? Oh.... ...Tomorrow's my birthday, isn't it?"

She immediately regretted saying anything. This was the worst time possible to remind him of something like that. "Oh, Seifer, I'm sorry. I didn't mean-"

"Never mind. Just help me up. I want to get out of here before it gets dark and the big beasties are attracted by all this blood." She helped him to his feet and he looked around at the ground, the blood, the flies, and Hyperion laying over to the side. The edge of the blade was stained by a small amount of blood, insignificant compared to the amount Seifer had spilt all over the ground, but at the same time it meant so much more. It was Squall's blood. Seifer hadn't injured Squall while sparring in years, and after he did, Squall just snapped and.... Seifer carefully slipped a hand inside the rip in his shirt and felt the newly formed scar that stretched across his abdomen above his naval. He had to forcefully rip himself from that train of thought and get back to his surroundings.

Seifer picked up Hyperion and pulled a miraculously clean handkerchief from his pocket. he carfully wiped the blood off the blade, then folded the handkerchief back up and placed it in his jacket's chest pocket. "Let's go."

Rinoa nodded once and started walking away to the west. Seifer blinked at her and then quickly ran to catch up with her. "Why are you walking? Can't you just do your whole blinky-blinky thing and take us home?"

She stopped walking and looked up at him sadly. "Seifer, I was in such a hurry to get here and heal you that I couldn't regulate the power I used. I don't have enough power left to teleport more than one person, and even if I did take one of us I wouldn't be able to assure it's stability. You might end up somewhere else entirely from where I meant to take you, or if you did get to the right place, you might be missing something important, like an arm. You might arrive in several pieces. This seemed like the better option." She started walking again.

"Oh." Seifer blinked at her retreating back and ran to catch up to her again, slinging Hyperion over his shoulder.

They left that place of blood and bad memories for the flies.

* * *

Silent for too long. Neither one spoke. Only the sound of their footsteps. Tense, uncomfortable, miserable. Seifer had to speak. 

"Rinoa? What happened?"

A pause. Deliberating. Trying to organize thoughts, to figure out how to answer. Rinoa spoke in a small voice - not wanting to say it - as if vocalizing it will make it more real. It couldn't _be_ any more real.

"...Squall killed you."

"No, I mean, what _happened_?"

Another pause, slightly longer, thoughts arranging and rearranging and still coming to the same end. "I think... there's another sorceress...."

That was the last they said for a while.


	4. Chapter Three

**Notes:** Well, here's where the chapters start getting short again - sorry about that, but it'll start getting some sort of constant length around chapter five or so. Five is when the _stuff_ starts happening. Emotional drivel here, and I have a bit to say about that: I am overly emotional, and generally pretty whiney about it. When I write stuff, the characters and going to be just as unbalanced as I am, though maybe not quite so whiney about it. I can't really help it, that's just how I project myself into my writings. I'll try to work on that for future fics. However, it works rather nicely in this one!

And last of all: Why the f--k isn't my space bar working properly? This is highly irritating.

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**Consume - Chapter Three**

Seifer sat on his bed. His back against the wall, his legs dangling. 

He wasn't doing anything. He wasn't waiting. Just sitting, trying not to think. Staring straight across the room.

Just staring.

Opposite from where Seifer sat was a table, a mirror on the wall behind it.

He stared into his own reflection. From the bottom of his eyes he could see what was on the table.

_December twenty-first..._

Every year Sq-_he_ threw a surprise party. Every year it was less of a surprise.

No celebration this year.

Sq-his plan had been simple - distract Seifer, leave presents on his table, wait for him to notice them, burst into the room.

Seifer had been distracted. The gifts had been left. Then, _something..._

Sq-he always wrapped his gifts neatly; creases folded with surgical precision, paper always a solid dark color, a simple note on white paper.

Seifer stared into his reflection - did not look down - _would not_ look down. But he could still see... ...at the top of the pile...

Sq-he wasn't here this year. He was gone...

...wrapped in dark blue paper...

With the threat of a new sorceress...

...a small white envelope...

...everyone was frightened...

...Seifer's name in small neat letters...

...Sq...he was gone...

...simple twine holding it all together...

...serving the sorceress...

_Squall..._

Seifer got up and left the room.


End file.
